The belt buckle that was awarded to the grand champion of the Kosher BBQ at Congregation Agudas Achim Sunday afternoon.

SAN ANTONIO — When Jack Lea told his friends he was participating in a kosher barbecue competition, their reactions were all the same.

“They had no idea barbecue could be kosher,” said the 13-year-old Lea.

But Sunday's inaugural Texas Kosher BBQ Championship, a fundraiser for Congregation Agudas Achim in northwest San Antonio, proved how wrong they were — to quote the event's theme, “no pork butts about it.”

In all, volunteers served 750 pounds of brisket, chicken and beef ribs, plus 120 pecan pies, 1,200 cookies, and 20 peach cobblers, give or take a few, said Randy Pulman, president of the 125-year old Jewish congregation.

All of the food followed kosher dietary rules. And it went like hotcakes.

About 2,000 people went through the gate; all the meat was gone by about 2 p.m.

“To say that it went beyond our wildest expectations is an understatement,” Pulman said.

Twenty teams participated, and the event was open to people of all faiths. Lea, for example, is not Jewish, but he and his father helped out Pulman, who is an old friend. St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church entered a team, as did The Barn Door and Drew's American Grill restaurants.

Among the team's monikers, biblical references abounded — the Golden Calf Grillers, the Lost Tribe. Pulman headed up a team called the Smoke'n Hot Red Heifers, a cow and color also mentioned in the Bible.

The event was created in tribute to Texas ranchers Emma Freeman and her sons Joe and Harry Freeman, who were benefactors of the congregation.

More than anything, Pulman said the event was held to show the congregation is “an integral part of the community.”

But after spending all night preparing for the massive kosher cook-off, was an exhausted Pulman ready to commit to another barbecue extravaganza next year?